EVERYTHING is an adventure

Thoughts and Words

It struck me this past week, when I was being email-attacked by a client’s vendor, that people have forgotten how to be nice. Are the days of friendliness and adult conversations really gone? Have people forgotten their manners and what their parents tried so hard to teach them? We’re all fighting our own battles out there, granted, but there are these WTF moments in life that take my mind into a world of sharks and villains and downright nastiness.

So the big question is: WHY? Honestly, why? Why do people feel the need to take out their anger on other people? Why do they feel the need to mask their insecurities with accusations of blame? Why do they feel the need to push people into the mud-pit for challenging them?

I can’t actually answer those questions, but I can tell you that despite the way that I have been treated on occasions in my life, I do believe that people are inherently good. For some, it just lies a shit load deeper than in others.

So I challenge you! Soul Pancake shared a video late last year that inspired people on the street to compliment each other and I thought it was really cute. And relevant to me right now. What if we were to compliment someone, instead of berating them? What if we told people the good things we thought about them instead of focusing on the bad? (Yes, some people really are just assholes, but I’m pretty sure that there is something in them that is good, you’ll just have to look really really really deep.) Don’t you think it would change their lives in a teensy weensy little way that can create a bigger positive change as a result?

So it is officially the run-up to Valentine’s Day, or as my friend @sadhcrazy likes to call it, ‘Single Awareness Day’. Because that is exactly what it is to us singletons. A day when couples all over the world are showering each other with love and affection (whether they want to or not), while us singletons come up with something to do that evening to shift the focus away from being single again on Valentines Day.

Well I’d like to tell you why that is exactly what I would like to be doing on this auspicious occasion.

I often get the whole ‘Candice, why are you still single’ enquiry. Like it is an unbelievable state of being for ‘someone like me’. Let me give you a brief run-down of some of my recent romantic encounters and I think that will answer that question (names have obviously been changed for anonymity reasons).

Let’s start with ‘Juan’. Juan is the boyfriend that every girl wants. Juan wants to massage your feet while you watch TV and run you a bath after you’ve had a really hard day. Juan also likes to flip a switch in his brain at any given moment to turn into a screaming, swearing, searing dragon. You can turn from ‘gorgeous angel’ to ‘heinous bitch’ in 3,4 seconds, if you just choose Juan as your long term partner. You don’t even need to do anything.

Enter Jeffrey. Jeffrey is sauve. Jeffrey has money and loves to spend it. On you. Whatever you want. Jeffrey also sucks up your soul and owns you. Jeffrey has his talons in your chest and rips and turns them every time that it seems like you’re going to escape. But don’t worry, the brand new Gucci shades hide the screaming pain behind your eyes.

And Dave. Dave is confident. Dave is friends with everyone. Dave is fun and Dave is connected. Dave only knows how to think about Dave. Even the amount of times I’ve mentioned Dave in this sentence can’t possibly be enough for Dave. Dave likes bums. Dave is obsessed with bums. You should be honoured to have Dave grab your bum. What do you mean, you’re not interested? Dave is big on Twitter, for goodness sake.

Do I need to continue? I have loads more where that came from.

So I think it is now fairly obvious as to why I am thoroughly relieved (read ecstatic) to be single on Valentines Day.

Life is too short to be stuck in an unhappy relationship. That’s my quote. Be sure to credit me.

Sometimes, someone sends you something at exactly the right time that just has you in hysterics. I’ve had a fairly serious week and it has definitely lacked a steady flow of humour. So when a friend mailed me these, they could not have come at a better time. They’re not even the funniest I’ve seen in my life, but, timing is everything, friends.

I am a fan of random acts of kindness, but random acts of giggles are welcome in my life 🙂

Whilst being stuck in Chiang Mai, hanging around the city, I visited one of the many temples in the city (Wat Pra Singh) to pass the time. Having been to Thailand before and done the whole ‘visit the temples’ thing, I wasn’t too excited about it, but this temple was actually really interesting as you could wander around the temple grounds, discovering random words of wisdom pinned to the trees.

Here are some that I found quite interesting. I hope that you find something here that speaks to you.

Ha ha ha…if you’re reading this post, then I will probably get along with you – your sick sense of curiosity amuses me 😉

This past weekend brought with it my 10 year high school reunion. After much umming and aahing, I eventually decided to go and see what happened to the jocks and the blonde squad.

And here are my reasons why you should not go to your high school reunion:

1. If it is organised by Miss Priss Prefect, it’s unlikely to have any fun attached to it, unless you are there to show off the big diamond rock on your finger and pretend that your life of baby puke and finding the 6 pack in your husband’s beer boep is amaaaaaaaazing. I guess that can be fun for some.

2. You’re likely not to recognise a lot of the people and spend the entire time making your brain split open trying to remember names and how you know the person. They’re looking at you with that same pained look.

3. There will always be that someone who completely ignored your existence in high school and is now suddenly asking intimate details of your life. Awkward.

4. The days of bitching about every other “group” of people in school is so far gone that I don’t even remember what it’s all about. I’m pretty sure that I wasn’t very good at it in the first place.

5. You will feel like a monkey in a zoo.

6. The high school dynamics don’t change. Same shit, different decade. Rather keep up with people’s amaaaaaaazing (pretend) lives on Facebook. It’s easier that way.

7. If you wanted to keep in touch with everyone at school, you would have. Forced friendship for an evening is not natural.

That being said, I am actually glad I went to that revolting event. It made me realise how happy I am with the life that I have created for myself. It made me appreciate what I have achieved and the place that I am in right now. I am okay with those crow’s feet forming at the side of my eyes because it means that I have grown up. That’s more than a lot of others can say.

The one constant in life is change
…
The universe, from atom to galaxy, is in a perpetual state of flux
We humans, don’t like change
We fight it
It scares us
So we create the illusion of stasis
We want to believe in a world at rest
The world of right now
Yet our great paradox remains the same
The moment we grasp the now, that now is gone
We claim the snapshots, but life is moving pictures
Time forces us to grow
To adapt
Because every time we blink our eyes, the world shifts beneath our feet.